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Monday, 22 March 2010

This is Melina at her best; gut wrenching and powerful. I read it in one day, the whole 328 pages of it. I could not put it down.

The story centers on Tom Mackee, one of the group of friends, from Saving Francesca. (It’s not necessary to have read this, but its well worth it) His uncle has died, his mother has moved to Brisbane with his sister, his Dad’s on a bender and disappeared, he’s dropped out of Uni: everything in his life is broken.

While high on drugs, mucking around, he falls from a table and splits his head open. Going home after getting out of the hospital, he finds all his stuff dumped on the front lawn – his flat-mates have chucked him out.

And so he finds himself at the mercy of Francesca, whom he has had nothing do with for the 2 years since his world fell apart.

Melina explores grief and how destructive and alienating it can, and the redemption that can be found through true friends, forgiveness and love. I’ve made it sound a bit soppy, but its not.

Friday, 12 March 2010

It begins with a hugely overweight teenager standing on the edge of the train station platform, contemplating.

Will he jump or won't he?

Would people laugh?

Would anyone miss him?

As he contemplates he hears a voice which distracts him and possibly saves his life. The voice comes from a ferrety blonde kid, who overweight Troy discovers is the legendary Curt McCrae. Curt is known to be a genius guitar player/sometimes student/dropout/punk rock artist god.

Troy can't believe his ears when Curt asks him to be a drummer in his band.

Thursday, 11 March 2010

Bianca wants to escape.Enrolled into the Gothic and eerie boarding school 'Evernight', Bianca knows she doesn't fit in with the all-too-perfect students that surround her. In attempt to flee Bianca finds herself in the presence of Lucas Ross a boy who is most certainly NOT 'Evernight' material, just like her. Lucas ignores the rules, stands up to the 'popular' kids and warns Bianca to be careful about caring for him. But the attraction is undeniable even though they try soon enough the power of first love consumes them. However both have their secrets that just may tear them apart.One could be forgiven for thinking that Evernight is jumping on the Twilight bandwagon, with the vampire, ill-fated love story. But you couldn't be further from the truth. Having read both Twilight and Evernight I can assure you that's where the similarities end. I'm not sure what it is about Evernight but Claudia Gray's intriguing world clicks together like pieces of a jigsaw puzzle. The characters, the storyline; which will continue to shock you till the very end, and the writing were perfect.Without spoiling too much of the storyline, you will be intrigued, after all you spend the first half of the book wondering who'se the vampire? Lucas or Bianca? It's a WOW moment when the truth is revealed. I found myself re-reading many paragraphs going 'WHAT!' unable to believe the twists and turns the story had taken. Gray avoids the obvious vampire cliches and mixes traditional folk lore with the more modern day beliefs.The romance between Bianca and Lucas is very believable with moments of raw passion before switching to the sweet and adorable. It's a relationship that has you asking 'Why can't that be me?" To sum it up would be to say that love is found, trust is lost, hearts are broken and secrets are revealed.To be honest the story blew me away. Nothing is predictable in this story.The ending leaves one hanging out for more. But fear not the follow up Stargazer is already out as well as is the third book in the series Hourglass.Have a read and become addicted with me :)

Monday, 1 March 2010

Not quite human, not quite dead, Denny Colt assumes the duty of Central City’s masked superhero, known as The Spirit. Killed while on cop duty, Colt's return from the dead is a mystery, even to himself.

The movie, adapted from Will Eisner's The Spirit, revolves around The Spirit's attempt to stop his evil nemesis, The Octopus (Samuel L. Jackson) from obtaining a chest, which contains the secret to immortality. Sand Serif (Eva Mendes), the Spirit’s childhood sweetheart and jewellery thief is also in on the treasure hunt fuelled by her obsession with shiny objects. In between battling the bad guys, The Spirit also manages to find time to seduce the women around him.

This movie is just like a comic book come to life with great visual graphics, voice-overs and wisecrack remarks. I was expecting a serious, violent and possibly gruesome movie but I found the movie to be quite humorous amidst the action and its stylised action meant that the only blood I saw were objects coloured in red. I even enjoyed the stereotypical characters although Samuel L. Jackson was my favourite actor, managing to perfectly pull off a very weird and insane evil guy. This movie has been heavily criticised but I really enjoyed it.